The Environmental Protection Agency recently pledged to spend the next five years studying the effects of glyphosate, the most commonly used herbicide in the U.S. and the main ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup, on 1,500 endangered species.

It’s getting harder and harder for opponents of GMO labeling to ignore the mushrooming opposition to the Deny Americans the Right to Know Act, or DARK Act. This anti-environment and anti-farmworker bill would block states and local governments from passing GMO labeling laws to give Americans more information about their food. More than 300 organizations, companies, food industry and social justice leaders are working together to defeat this legislation, which Big Food and Big Ag are spending millions to pass.

An EWG survey of athletic fields and parks in a six-state sample of small-town America shows that more than 90 percent of these recreational areas are within 1,000 feet of a corn or soybean field where two toxic weed killers could well be sprayed, meaning that anyone playing there is likely to be exposed. More than 56 percent were within 200 feet.

When Congress votes this week on legislation to block GMO labeling, far more will be hanging in the balance than the simple question of whether consumers will be allowed to know whether their food was produced with a novel – and still largely unproven – technology.

One of the world’s leading experts on cancer risk, Dr. Christopher Portier, told an international conference in London this week that he is certain that glyphosate, the weed killer most commonly used with genetically engineered crops or “GMOs,” can damage human DNA in ways that could lead to cancer.

The anti-labeling DARK Act sponsored by Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-Kans.) is now also an anti-environment, anti-farmworker and anti-public health bill. The latest version could rip more than 100 laws from the books of 43 states as they pertain to genetically engineered crops, or “GMOs.”

Genetically engineered crops, commonly called “GMOs,” have led to an explosion in the use of toxic weed killers linked to cancer and other health problems – and people in America’s heartland are most at risk of exposure.

Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-Kan.) doesn’t seem to understand his own anti-GMO labeling bill. During a hearing on a new version of H.R. 1599, Pompeo argued that his bill – which critics have called the DARK act, for Deny Americans the Right to Know -- to block state GMO labeling laws would allow companies to continue to make voluntary claims that their products don’t contain GMO ingredients.

The new version of H.R. 1599 is a radical overreach that does not simply deny consumers the right to know what’s in their food or how it is grown. The new version of legislation dubbed the Deny Americans the Right to Know or “DARK” Act also denies state and local governments the right to protect farmers and rural residents from the environmental impacts of GMO crops. It’s shocking and must be rejected.

At Ben & Jerry’s, we’re really proud of the ingredients we use in our ice cream and we’ve always been happy to tell our fans what’s in the pint. We love talking about our long-term relationship with the St. Albans Dairy Co-op, the Greyston Bakery and Rhino Foods. We’re proud of our fair-trade and non-GMO ingredients, which is why it’s so hard for me to understand why any company wouldn’t want to scream from the rooftops about the ingredients it uses.